Dear Ed...

You never know what you're going to get...

Not all our days are going to be good days, I realize that.  Thankfully this day was going to be my good day even if it wasn't going to be his.  I'd woken up feeling refreshed for the first time in so very long and I'd gotten in an entire workout and quiet time before G even woke up.  And he woke up on the wrong side of the bed.

"Time for school!" caused a meltdown of epic proportions.  Again, he doesn't realize who he's dealing with.  I had my endorphins and coffee, I was ready!  

The crying, oh the crying.  And hiding under his desk.  And name calling.  And threats.  All this him towards me, understand.  I just sat patiently in my chair going through the first lesson of the day.  He hid under his desk yelling about hating me and hating school.

I told him I was going to take a picture of him and show everyone on Facebook that he's a bratface.  So he smiled.  

There it is, the infamous G pouty lip.  It's a thing of beauty isn't it?  He's been working it for years now.  I'm immune.  Unless I know he's hurt himself and then I see the lip, then my tough mommy immunity goes out the door.

Tears!  Oh the tears!  

After letting him throw a 5 year old fit for about 25 minutes we got down to work.  I waited him out and all was well for the rest of the school day.  I thought for sure this was going to be a good day since it had started so for me, but obviously G had other plans.  

Two weeks ago G and I were working on the phonics lesson of the day. The sound was /W/ was in water, wear, wave, etc. I tell G that the sound is /w/ and then I proceeded to stick my hand up, wave like a parade queen and said, "Okay, what am I doing?" 

He nonchalantly said, "Flapping your arm fat?"

Thanks for having my back there, son.

Hey!  I work out damnit, I don't have bat wings.  Okay really I do but geeze!

One of the phonics sounds we learned today was the /Y/. There was a little ditty they had to go along with it. "There's a y- y- y- yeti, doing y- y- y- yoga. On a y- y- y- yellow, y- y- y- yacht."

So the rest of the day I've heard G singing this little song. Sometimes softly, sometime not so much. One time he said, "There's a y- y- y- yeti, doing y- y- y- karate." I told him, "Uh, he's supposed to be doing yoga. Y for yoga." He snapped his fingers, "Oh yeah, my bad," and he began again. "There's a y- y- y- yeti, doing y- y- y- Yoda."

I had to walk away.  Because I needed to find a Kleenex as I had snorted so unexpectedly.  He slays me.

then sings my soul...

http://imgur.com/r/GetMotivated/9lzZGLN

*sigh*
It sums up so much.  So very, very, very much.

We had a good day!

We had a good school day today.  The math lesson was a new concept for G.  So up to this point he's probably been pretty bored with the math work.  Phonics, while not easy (again he struggled with ending sounds) was tolerable mostly because I didn't let him tick me off.  Maybe it was the toast and homemade jam I ate before we got started?  He had a unit assessment and he did brilliantly on it, of course.  We got to learn more about the Coral Reef in Australia, which he's now convinced we HAVE to go see.  

Here he's grouping like items.  His task was to make a group of four where one didn't belong.

He was feeling a little cheesy so of course I took advantage of that.  It's so easy to see both the baby he was and the man he'll someday be in this ^^ picture.

And the shithead he is currently of course.

And in this math task he's trying to make a pattern.

I'm actually really surprised that he doesn't struggle much with handwriting so far.  He hasn't shown any interest in it up until school started.  Maybe it was the awesome fat ticonderoga pencils that his father insisted he have.  Usually when he's working on his writing his tongue sticks out a little because he's concentrating.  But of course when I took this ^^ picture it wasn't.

I mentioned it to him. so he did this ^^.

We spend more time on the computer than I thought we would at this grade level but all in all school itself, in the classroom takes us less than three hours each day.  Then we can school all over the place like we usually do.

I love it when he's in the mood to learn because it makes the day so much more enjoyable for both of us.  If school consisted only of the study of the solar system and all things related to the human body he'd be even more on board for this learning thing.

still sweet after all these years.

Siren hurt her leg somehow today.  She's just not feeling great since the weather/temp has changed and her arthritis is bothering her.  G covered her up with his Buzz blankie in the hopes that she'd feel better.  

I took that as my opportunity to take a few pictures of her crabby, "I don't feel good face."  Which is really just like her, "I'm tired leave me the hell alone," face.  She's such a good sport.

Oh those jowls.  My favorite thing to capture in a photograph yet the bane of my having to scrub the walls thanks to Siren spit existence.

She loves it when he gets on her bed with her.  

It may seem like a look of disgust but really, she loves it.  Any attention...even for the slightest second, makes her happy.

It's so strange to think that she's been part of basically every single one of my days for almost exactly nine years now.  I couldn't ask for a better dog.

I am a member of a Facebook group that deals with boxer rescue in our area.  There was a boy that I almost had E talked into but one of his personality quirks is a big issue for me so we'll have to pass on him.  But he looked like he'd be such a great fit.  G would love a younger dog, maybe one that will play fetch.  This dog's name is Cyrus though, Cyrus and Siren?  Sheesh that'd be interesting.  I'm not dying to get another dog but Siren's not going to be around forever, much to my chagrin.  So we'll do it when the time seems to be right for us.  I'll have to start all over with the talking into/begging process with E but he's a softy, he just doesn't want anyone to know it.

wasabi ice cream

Let me set the scene: nice sushi restaurant, just me and the boy.
Dilemma: "Mom, I need to go potty."  Okay, leave food on the table unattended, pick up my purse and the tablet, etc. and walk to the bathrooms, which are both occupied.
"Mommy, I really gotta go."
"Yes, buddy, I understand that but we have to wait our turn."
*wait* *wait* *wait*
Meltdown: The boy starts to tear up and wails loudly, "Mommy Imma poop my pants."
"Son, just hold on please.  You can hold it."
The boy grabs his backside just to make a point.

Do we walk all the way back through the restaurant and go out the door with our food on the table, across the parking lot to Arby's where surely there's at least one bathroom unoccupied?  The boy starts pulling down his pants in the hallway because damnit, he's not about to poop in his pants.  I'm panicking because I haven't even heard a toilet flush from either bathroom so I check the handles again just to make sure and yes, they're both locked.

Just as I'm about to throw him over my shoulder and make a run for it a stupid teenage girl comes walking out the bathroom door with makeup in her hand and obviously freshly applied (or re-applied) makeup.

Her: "Oh whoops, I thought I heard someone out here."
Me: "Take your whoops and move along before that lipstick becomes permanently embedded in your nose."

He had already started to pull down his pants before she even cleared the doorway because that poor child was on a mission.  He barely made it but the good news is, he made it.

Traumatizing.  More so for me than him because he would have taken a dump right there in hallway if I'd let him.  We went back to our table, ate dinner (way overpriced for not enough food but the sushi was good) and then finally went home after what turned out to be a ridiculously long day in town.

That's a scenario I hope we never have to revisit.    

a sticker pal!

Another mom sent out a request on one of my homeschool boards for a child close in age to her six year old to trade stickers with and become pen pals.  I jumped on it for G since he doesn't really have "classmates," to speak of.  G picked out some stickers and the wrote his first ever "letter" to someone.  It took f.o.r.e.v.e.r. and the eraser is gone from the pencil he used but he did it!

Now we get to wait for an envelope from  Austin in California to see what he wrote to us!  G loves getting mail so mail with stickers?  BONUS!

math assessments today

After working on phonics, which we tackle first thing because we both hate it (I love to read, hate phonics) we did TWO math assessments.  This was his second one.  The material seems so easy huh?  I'm hoping we start learning some new stuff soon but until then I'll take the 100% scores and brag just a little!

G has this program that is part of his curriculum called Reading Eggs (www.readingeggs.com).  He started it last week and as of last night he was on level 13 (of 120 levels so it will last most of the school year I'm sure).  I was shocked when I watched him playing the game because he was doing things like reading short sentences.  :o  Well the program should have made him do a placement test when we began it so that it could put him in the proper level and not make him do all the legwork of easy stuff beforehand.  Our teacher saw that G never took the placement test so she had to reset it.

I asked for warning before she reset it because I knew he was going to be upset about losing all his prizes and critters (that he earns on each level).  She reset it this morning and he took the placement test.  Instead of setting him back...he went from level 13 to level 21.  Ha.  Little did I know, he can "read" better than I knew!  I made a pretty big deal about it and he was just excited to have "earned" another 7 critters that he didn't even have to work for.  Yay smarty pants!

soft kitty, warm kitty...ribbit?

Remember this post from about a month ago about the giant bullfrog I found?  Well last night G found him.  The same frog!  He's obviously nocturnal.  We brought him inside to show daddy (it was about 9:15 at night) and then we made him a little home in a styrofoam cooler and brought him into the trailer with us for movie night.

G has renamed him to Jupiter.

Well Jupiter was making his little froggy noises and trying in vain to escape the styrofoam cooler.  He was a noisy bugger!  G asked me why Jupiter was making that noise and I told him that the frog was scared and he was crying.  Well of course G being the soft heart (ha, that's sarcasm) that he is, he didn't want Jupiter to be scared and crying.  I suggested we take him back to where we found him so he could go home.

Instead G started to sing to him..."soft kitty, warm kitty, little ball of fur..."

I asked him what he was doing.  "Making him feel better so he won't cry."

As hard as it was, after a little while G relented to taking poor Jupiter back by the bunkhouses and letting him go.  And then we spent about 30 minutes, at 10:00 at night, tracking Jupiter in the hopes of seeing where he lives.

There's just not enough time in the day...

I don't ignore it.  Okay, I lie, sometimes I do.  I walked from the office to the back door the other day and I was barefoot and I realized it's been at least a week since I last swept the kitchen floor.  Did I grab the broom and fix that?  Nope.  Because if I'm going from point A to point B it's for a reason, don't let me get sidetracked.  Throwing homeschooling into our every day has made my pseudo-ADD worse than it was before.  If I'm doing something and realize something else needs to be done and stop to do that, I invariably forget what I'd started out doing.  Between school, my paying work and working out, the housework is slacking.

I'm glad we don't get visitors because otherwise I'd feel like a completely useless housekeeper.

Oops, must stop blogging, it's time to get out the vacuum before anyone else can make a mess on the living room floor.  I guess I can get the kitchen floor done while I'm at it.

Oh wait, I have a bunkhouse to clean before a POE crew comes up and invades over both bunkhouses on Monday.  So my house might have to wait...

Pro.

the boy and his toys

I sold some of G's toddler type gear on Craigslist and pocketed an easy $120 with three items.  Like the bike trailer we never use because he got a big boy bike for his 5th birthday.  Or the toy storage organizer which we stopped using when his toys started to overflow it.  I should have used it for school supplies but I literally thought of that while waiting for the purchaser in the Safeway parking lot.  And his Thomas big wheel that he never really rode much because when he was in the age range for that toy he had no interest whatsoever in pedaling.  I was hoping the low riding nature of that trike would entice him to work on pedaling but it didn't.

G loved seeing the money going into my wallet though.  He decided he should get a cut of it since it was his stuff I was selling.  I explained patiently that I am the one who paid for that stuff originally and I was just trying to get back some of my investment.  He decided that we needed to use it to buy more Lego's because when he gets bored with them then I can sell them and make my money back.

Too bad I'm related to some Lego freaks and I know that no matter how old a boy is, he doesn't stop playing with Legos.  I took the $$ and put it in G's savings account which is what I've done with any money I've made off of a G related item.

hot shit

I bought a super cute kind of cut off sweatshirt a few weeks ago.  It reminds me of the 80's but still stylish enough for today.  I don't tend to buy trends so I was surprised I like it.

And I really do like it.  I thought I looked kind of hip, certainly younger than my 35 years.

Yesterday at Walmart I saw three other women wearing my sweatshirt.  One was easily 50 and weighed about 300 pounds.  The other was probably late 60's and the last one was using a walker.

What.the.hell is wrong with me?  What kind of club am I in?  The fashion impaired?  When did I become such an old lady?  :(

mean girls

I have been a part of some online forums for awhile.  I don't even remember when I first started joining them.  They were just groups of women forming online friendships.

Then I started trying to have a baby and I was part of a forum about trying to conceive.  Then I got pregnant and I joined a pregnancy forum.  I've formed some strong online friendships with women that I've never met in real life but who I feel I know well and who make me be a better mother.

Then Facebook happened and I got to watch other's children grow right along with my own.  Then Facebook created groups and we had spin off sects from the pregnancy board.  That's where it starts to get a little different.  Groups were formed when differences of opinions and childrearing styles exploded into all out fighting.  One offended person would start her own group and it became more of a popularity contest on who got into the new and exclusive group.  

I recently quit the Facebook groups for two reasons.  The first is because I was letting them take up too much of my time.  I enjoyed the conversations I had with these women, the things we've shared but I was spending too much time doing this superfluous chatting and not enough time focusing on my real life.  It was an escape.

And secondly, I grew tired of the mean girls mentality.  Two women would have an issue with each other and all of a sudden several of the women joined one of the women to argue/crucify the other woman.  I hate the group bullying.  When I have a problem with someone I take it directly to them and we work it out.  Even if someone was doing/saying something I didn't agree with I tried hard not to jump on the bitchy bandwagon just for the fun of it.  And that's just it, it wasn't fun.

But mostly I started to think about who I was in these groups, what role I played and I realized I didn't like who I was.  I didn't fit in with one group or the other.  I treated them as make believe because really that's what they are.  Since I've never met these women in real life to me they don't exactly exist.  I mean of course they do but they kind of don't.  And I started to consider that if in ten years I was associated with these types of groups would I be happy or proud about what was discovered about me through them?  Likely not.

I'm NOT saying there's anything wrong with these kinds of groups and there certainly isn't anything less than awesome about these women, it's just a decision I am making to work on being a better me and that doesn't jive with drama.

Wow, that's a whole lot of who cares information huh?    

I'm pretty sure this is how most people on Facebook see me.  Well, lady might be a stretch but definitely a pervert.  Or at least unfiltered?  I should probably employ a filter a little more often.

Am I whining?

It seems like I'm whining about homeschooling doesn't it?  I don't mean to, I'm feeling pretty appreciative of it.  Is it easy?  No.  I've learned that those who succeed at it are those who put their all into it.  Lazy parents aren't very good at homeschooling.  I like to think I'm not a lazy parent.  G whined and threw a few little fits this morning because he didn't want to go to school.  Too bad, bud.  Then I threw a little fit because he was jerking me around during the phonics lesson.  We're both big crybaby brats.

He learned how to draw a cow yesterday.  Don't worry, that's not all he learned, this is just one fun thing :D

but I like control

One of our biggest issues is with G controlling himself.  He just doesn't get that expectation.  School is helping considerably but there are still many, many times in our short school day where I have to remind him.  In fact the other day I removed his new red chair and made him sit in one of the plain old wood kitchen chairs because he can't spin around in it or jack it up and down.  He didn't appreciate that much.  All the things on this list after the word don't...yeah I've done them.  Well maybe not the shaming because that's just not who I am.  :(

Here I am, reading along the instructions on the page below.  Out loud.  To G.  Something in there tripped me up though.  Typos make me laugh.

That's what he said too.

Hm, f-f-f-towel?

Handsome pumpkin

Yay for erasers!

We love to read!  Or he loves to follow along in the book anyway.